QUARTIER LATINITIES (IV) 



If there are those who desire to study a phase of 

 cuiTency that has escaped the notice of the bi-metal- 

 lists, let them turn aside into the Quartier Latin, and 

 behold the apotheosis of the sou. In the grey and 

 graceless streets that pour their contribution of dirty 

 people into the Rue de Rennes, or exhale their heavy 

 breath round the Mont Parnasse cemetery, the 

 Napoleon seems to belong to a forgotten mythology, 

 the franc has a sinecure as the mere parent of coppers, 

 and shop-fronts, cabarets, and cremeries are decked in 

 honour of the centime, are thronged by those whose 

 lives are daily renewed through the utterance of the 

 halfpenny. 



A short expedition in the Rue de la Gaiete can be 

 very enlightening on these points, especially if the 

 horn- be one of those hurrying ones between eight 

 o'clock and dejeuner. To walk on the pavement is 

 all but impossible, such is the throng of stout French- 

 women in blue aprons and cloth boots promenading 

 hat less in the hot sun, and such is their resolve not 

 to yield an inch of the small available space. What 

 is it on which they fatten, with an inevitability that 

 neither hastes nor rests? Their appearance would 

 suggest a diet of sofa cushions, stewed in lard; yet 

 their purchases seem mainly to consist of penny- 

 worths of radishes, bottles of claret at fourpence 

 apiece, and yards of that crusty bread which, though 

 it might make a very reliable walking-stick, could in 



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